How to build Annual Operating Plan (AOP) in 2023?

Monday, 26/12/2022 09:00 (GTM +7)

The year’s final quarter is commonly called the “AOP season” among startups. During this time, creating a comprehensive operation plan for the upcoming year is crucial and demands a laser focus on every aspect.

Together with ITI Fund, let’s gain insights into the AOP (Annual Operating Plan) concept and the key considerations that startups must keep in mind in digital transformation.

What is AOP

The Annual Operating Plan (AOP), a crucial tool for enterprises, provides a comprehensive outline of operational goals, business plans, revenue and expenditure budgets for the upcoming year.

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By creating the AOP, startups can understand their business landscape comprehensively, enabling business leaders and employees to grasp specific tasks fully. This, in turn, helps the company move closer to initial goals and develop in the right direction.

The Roles of AOP in Startups

The aspect of business:

Supporting identified goals to create the foundation for striving in a unified, unbiased, and optimal manner.
Helping leaders to operate, check and evaluate the process of departments and divisions.
Ensuring the progress is under control.
Creating a premise for the orientation of business activities in the following years.

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The aspect of marketing:

Serving as a valuable tool for refining business plans and strategies, contributing to a comprehensive overview of the enterprise’s annual operations.
Facilitating the business’s financial capacity, ensuring that marketing plans are optimized for profitability. This enables businesses to make informed decisions and execute plans that align with their financial goals, ultimately leading to greater success.

How to build the AOP (Glints)

Step 1: Gather personnel – encouraging employees to give opinions can provide valuable information from all aspects of the business, helping to determine appropriate goals.
Step 2: Gaining an understanding of business performance through financial statements, operations, and other metrics can assist in identifying peak periods that necessitate budgeting, allocation of resources, and implementation of activities.
Step 3: Setting realistic goals – limiting the number of goals to five main objectives can help each department focus more easily.
Step 4: Set KPIs – using the results obtained from the previous steps, businesses can establish performance measurement indicators and determine the level of completion required to achieve their set goals.

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Step 5: Budget – Businesses can improve budget management by dividing it into monthly segments. Additionally, they can consider setting up a separate budget for scenarios such as cost increases, difficult periods to make a profit, and purchasing long-term assets. This ensures that the general budget does not overspend in these cases.
Step 6: Preparation – Predicting possible obstacles and risks in the annual operation plan can help businesses prepare to limit losses to the lowest level. This contributes to maintaining progress, efficiency, and effectiveness of AOP implementation.
Step 7: Regular Inspection – Periodically monitoring and tracking the progress of AOP implementation helps businesses quickly identify hindering factors. This allows them to propose suitable and timely improvement solutions.